Jodi Picoult has written 22 best selling novels. My Sister’s Keeper, which was also made into a movie in 2009, made the American Library Association’s list of most frequently challenged books 2010. ALA’s webpage lists the reasons: homosexuality, offensive language, religious viewpoint, sexism, sexually explicit, unsuited to age group, and violence. Jodi was kind enough to answer our email and tell us how she felt about it.

Several of my novels have been banned by school districts; MY SISTER’S KEEPER was one of the top ten challenged books of 2010. It’s quite heady to be part of a club that includes JK Rowling, Mark Twain, Maya Angelou, and Toni Morrison. But at the time, it made me ask myself if maybe I shouldn’t be writing these kinds of books. I don’t write about thorny issues for the shock value. I do it to make my readers think hard about problems most of us would like to pretend don’t even exist. Once people tell you what you should or shouldn’t read, it’s a short leap to being told what to do and what to say.